Midterm 1 Flashcards
Empiricism:
Using evidence from the senses as the basis for conclusions.
Demand Characteristics:
Aspects of an observational setting that make people behave as they think they should.
Case Study:
A descriptive research method that involves intensive examination of a specific person.
Population:
The entire set of individuals about whom we wish to draw a conclusion.
Sample:
A subset of individuals drawn from a population.
Representative Sample:
A sample that reflects the important characteristics of the population.
Correlation coefficient:
Ranges from -1.0 to +1.0. Sign indicates direction, absolute value indicates strength.
Experimental Research:
Manipulation of one variable and measuring changes in another variable while holding all other factors constant.
Syntax:
Word order.
Semantics:
The meaning of words and sentences.
Generativity:
The combination of symbols to generate infinite messages.
Displacement:
The ability to communicate things not physically present (past/future tense).
Surface Structure of Language:
The ways symbols are combined.
Deep Structure of Language:
The underlying meaning of combined symbols.
Morphemes:
The smallest units of meaning made of a combination of phonemes.
Phonemes:
Smallest units of sound recognizes as separate. There are 44 in the English Language.
Language of Infants (1-3 months):
Vocalize entire range of phonemes. Cooing.
Language of infants (6-12 months):
Discriminate sounds specific to their native language. Babbling and first words.
Wernicke’s Area of the brain:
Speech understanding.
Broca’s Area of the Brain:
Speech formation.
What are the criteria for a language?
Semantics, arbitrariness, displacement, productivity, cultural transmission.
Analogical representations of mental state:
Mental representations that have some of the physical characteristics of what they represent.
Symbolic representations of mental state:
Abstract mental representations that do not correspond to the physical features of objects or ideas.
Propositional Thought:
Expression of a statement.
Imaginal Thought:
Images that we can see, hear, or feel in our mind.
Motoric Thought:
Mental representations of motor movements.
Prototypes:
The “best” example which notes similarities.
Exemplar:
All examples compared to a new example. Experience.
Schema:
A mental blueprint of ways we organize knowledge into a mental concept.
Scrips:
Schema that directs behaviour over time within a situation. Schemas can lead to stereotypes.
Problem Solving Goals:
- Framing
- Generating Solutions
- Testing the Solution
- Evaluating Results
Algorithms:
Automatically generate correct solutions.
Heuristic:
General problem-solving strategies.
The first intellectual tests were developed by…
Chinese civil service.
Sir Francis Galton:
He quantified mental ability and believed it was inherited. He was influenced by Darwin’s theory of evolution.
Binet and Simon:
Produced the first psychological intelligence tests. Binet assumed mental abilities develop with age.
Mental Age:
A child’s intellectual standing compared to peers of the same age.
Stern’s Intelligence Quotient:
Mental age/chronological age * 100
Lewis Terman:
He revised Binet’s tests for the army.
David Wechsler:
Created the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS) and Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (WISC) and the Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence (WPPSI)
Psychometric Approach:
Attempts to map intelligence and performance.
Achievement vs Aptitude Tests:
How much someone knows vs their potential for future learning.
G Factor:
General intelligence.
Charles Spearmen:
Hypothesized g factor. Low g was related to heart disease, diabetes, Alzheimer’s, and drowning.
Fluid intelligence:
Dealing with novel situations without previous knowledge.
Crystallized Intelligence:
Application of previously learnt knowledge.
The Flynn Effect:
General IQ scores of a population increasing over time.
Standards for intelligence tests:
Test retest reliability, internal consistency, inter judge reliability, construct validity, content validity, criterion related.
J. Philippe Rushton:
A racist eugéniste who believed intelligence was determined by race.
Cross-Sectional Design:
Comparing subjects of different cohorts at the same time.
Issues with Cross-Sectional Design:
Different life experiences, generational experiences, environmental changes, and cultural changes.
Longitudinal Design:
Measure the same set of participants over a long period of time.
Issues with longitudinal design:
Time consuming, funding issues, participants may fall through, validity.
Sequential Design:
Measuring the same set of multiple cohorts over a long period of time. A blending of cross-sectional and longitudinal design.
Advantages to sequential design:
Comprehensive, accurate over a lifespan.
Germinal stage of Prenatal Development:
First two weeks, zygote formation, attaches to uterine wall.
Embryonic stage of Prenatal Development:
Weeks 2-8, embryo developing, placenta and umbilical cord present, heart beat, brain formation.
Fetal stage of Prenatal Development:
Weeks 9-40, becomes a fetus, muscles organs and systems develop, viability is found on the 28th week.
What in the Y sex chromosome makes someone a boy?
TDF (testis determining factor) is in the Y chromosome which initiates development of the testis which secrete androgen. This occurs in weeks 6-8 of pregnancy.
Environmental Factors Affecting prenatal Development:
Environmental agents (teratogens) like mercury, lead, radiation, nicotine. -> Abnormal prenatal development
Maternal malnutrition -> Miscarriage , prematurity, stillbirth, abnormal brain development
Maternal Stress -> Prematurity, infant irritability, ADHD
STIs -> Infant STIs, brain damage, blindness, deafness
Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder:
Physical, cognitive and behavioural deficits. Severe developmental abnormalities like facial abnormalities, underdeveloped brains and psychological/social impairments.
Newborn Vision:
Nearsighted, continuous development of visual acuity and stage-like development of discriminating features, few colours->full range in three months.
Habituation:
Recognize familiar over unfamiliar faces regardless of expression.
Newborn Sound localisation:
Ability to localize sound: 0-2 months, reappears at 4-5 months.
Newborn phoneme discrimination:
Better than adults until 12 months of age, disappears.
Newborn music perception:
Process and remember music, consonant and dissonant patterns.
Proximodistal Principle:
Development proceeds from the innermost parts to the outermost parts of the body.
Cephalocaudal Principle:
Development is from head to foot. Why the head is large at birth.
Motor development is (continuous/stage-like).
Stage-like
Piaget’s Stage Model of Schema:
Assimilation (new experiences in existing schema), disequilibrium (new experiences defy existing schema), accommodation (schema changes), equilibrium (new experiences incorporated into new schema).
This model is not very accurate.
Sensorimotor Stage:
0-2 years, learning through the senses, language acquisition, object permanence.
Preoperational Stage:
2-7 years, mental images and word association, abstract thought, pretend play, imagination, egocentric thoughts.
Concrete Operational Stage:
7-11 years, logic, tangible solutions, object properties stay when shape changes, abstract reasoning difficulties.
Formal Operational Stage:
11-12 years, logical in concrete and abstract problems, form and test hypothesis.
Vygotsky’s Sociocultural Theory:
(Zone of proximal development): Children can do more with assistance, provides insight to cognitive potential, others can increase a child’s cognitive development.
Attachment Process
Indiscriminate attachment - newborns, vocalized towards anyone.
Discriminate attachment - 3 months, towards caregivers.
Specific attachment behaviour - 7-8 months, meaningful attachment with primary caregivers.
